iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Reposted by Dr. David McBride (dwm)

psychologically sick with it @publicsexforest.golf · 26/09/2026

if you do not schedule maintenance the equipment will schedule it for you

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In Otter News @in-otter-news.bsky.social · 26/09/2026

After a long day at the aquarium, the otters help tidy their toys away. Payment is made promptly and entirely in ice cubes.

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Dr. David McBride (dwm) @dwm.me.uk · 24/09/2026

I really enjoyed listening to this.

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Reposted by Dr. David McBride (dwm)

Times Higher Education (THE) @timeshighered.bsky.social · 22/09/2026

A wave of cyberattacks on British academic blogs has raised concerns over efforts by authoritarian regimes to shut down research into human rights abuses www.timeshighereducation.com/news/f…

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John Bull @garius.bsky.social · 21/09/2026

one of my proudest moments was being told by a former Gove staffer that he once angrily proclaimed: "I am NOT an eldritch horror!" in a team meeting, because of me.

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Jason Kint @kint.bsky.social · 17/09/2026

Eye popping. Court just unsealed Summary Judgment motions in New York Times v OpenAI / Microsoft. Easy to see why the AI companies had so many redactions (pink). Their own people wrote the lede for NYT, the "largest theft of labor in human history"... "more and more substitutive..." /1

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Reposted by Dr. David McBride (dwm)

Tim Harford @timharford.ft.com · 13/09/2026

I've been checking the source of quotes for my forthcoming book, and the performance of Gemini is extraordinary. I paste the quote into Google, and Gemini will barge in with the wrong answer over and over again. It's not an occasional thing - it's reliably wrong. Very odd.

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Matt Bors @mattbors.bsky.social · 14/09/2026

It was exactly ten years ago today, on my 33rd birthday, that I posted this comic online.

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Reposted by Dr. David McBride (dwm)

Nanoraptor @nanoraptor.danamania.com · 12/09/2026

A sticker to place anywhere. Like hand dryers, toilet bowls, soap dispensers, alarm keypads, coffee machines, thermostats, pedestrian crossing buttons, BBQs, park benches, parking meters... As well as staplers, pens, potatoes, bricks, brooms, lunch, potplants and speed humps.

A piece of colourful corporate nonsense looking sticker stating NOW AI POWERED! Talk to me. Ask me to do things! with a happy little speech bubble computer-looking character, with shiny little AI stars and a space looking background in the middle. To be placed on things that look like maybe they could be AI powered, BUT ARE NOT.

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Charles Fourier @charlesfourier.bsky.social · 08/09/2026

Bill Bryson’s words seem appropriate to post right now

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John Burn-Murdoch @jburnmurdoch.ft.com · 08/09/2026

Two extraordinary charts from today’s PISA test results: 1) School test scores continue to collapse internationally, underscoring how this is no longer a Covid effect but sustained decline. Those falls in reading and maths are equivalent to about two years of lost schooling.

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Robert Saunders @robertsaunders.bsky.social · 07/09/2026

90 years ago, Parliament responded to the rise of Oswald Mosley's Blackshirts by passing the Public Order Act, which banned political uniforms, private militias and the threat of force for political objects. The debates make very resonant reading today. Here's the Liberal Robert Bernays. (Short 🧵)

You cannot conduct a fair match when one side is playing with a ball and the other with bombs and, if democracy is to survive, it must be conducted according to definite and recognised rule. One of them is that no political party should resort to any weapon other than reason and argument. The introduction of private armies, as I see it, strikes at the root of democracy. I know it is contended that the Blackshirts are not armed and, therefore, are not an army, but I do not think that argument can be upheld. … Uniformed men in military formation suggest, and are meant to suggest, the idea of force. It is no argument to reply that at this or that demonstration no force is intended. It is an inescapable fact that a uniform in politics symbolises force, to be used either now or in the future.

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Uncle Duke @uncleduke1969.bsky.social · 05/09/2026

The cats graciously put on a magic show for us last night. I figured out how they did most of the tricks, but I didn’t say anything, because that would have been rude.

Two cats on a platformed tower. One is on the lower level, head hidden behind the middle section. The second is on the top tier with only their head showing.

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Dr Anke Marsh @ankemarsh.bsky.social · 05/09/2026

Just so we are clear: The 83yo priest on the left is a terrorist. The balaclava-clad men on the right are protestors with legitimate concerns

A photo from the BBC of an older woman, with grey hair, being led away by police.

A photograph of a line of men in black clothes and balaclavas blocking the port at Dover.

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Twlldun @twlldun.bsky.social · 04/09/2026

Me, just before I’m not about to get away with it:

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Brian Wernham C.Eng. @brianwernham.bsky.social · 04/09/2026

I can't think of anything which is going to incentivise the Electoral Commission staff more 👇 "The Electoral Commission are useless, dumb and ineffective" - James Orr, senior aide to Farage

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John Burn-Murdoch @jburnmurdoch.ft.com · 03/09/2026

I hereby declare the "learn to code" era officially dead: Big declines in the number of people studying computer science in the last year or two 📉 Chart from this week’s edition of our newsletter on AI and the labour market www.ft.com/content/9183...

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Andrew Walsh @playbrarian.uk · 01/09/2026

On the off chance any neurodivergent students follow me (or their lecturers do which is more likely?), this seems like a brilliant thing to get involved with! A Little Book of Neurodiverse Hope - app.onlinesurveys.jisc.ac.uk/s/mmu/little...

app.onlinesurveys.jisc.ac.uk

Little Book of Neurodiverse Hope - Online Surveys | Online surveys

Online surveys is a powerful, easy to use tool for creating online surveys. Run by Jisc, Online surveys is used by over 300 different organisations in the UK...

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Reposted by Dr. David McBride (dwm)

Count Binface @countbinface.bsky.social · 01/09/2026

Can't get a moment's peace on this bloody planet.

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Sunder Katwala (sundersays) @sundersays.bsky.social · 26/08/2026

One key to British politics is that one quarter of the public are distinctly more likely than others to think most people agree with them (while often/mostly being a vocal minority)

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Dr. David McBride (dwm) @dwm.me.uk · 26/08/2026

Oh, good! I've long thought that I — and people richer than me — should be taxed harder. No, this is not sarcasm. There are things we all need that need paying for. www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

bbc.co.uk

Andy Burnham refuses to rule out tax rises in autumn Budget

Experts have warned that he and Chancellor John Healey will have little room to manoeuvre in their first Budget.

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Sophie E. Hill @sophieehill.bsky.social · 23/08/2026

The most predictable consequence of the Online Safety Act is UK government ministers promoting technology that claims to keep your kids safe online, but actually broadcasts their live GPS location to any moderately competent hacker. Great job everyone!

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Reposted by Dr. David McBride (dwm)

jamelle @jamellebouie.net · 23/08/2026

here is the thing. if you tell me that you believe that race is a biological category and that it is a guide to the objective superiority and inferiority of groups of people, i am not calling you a racist to *insult* you, i am calling you a racist because it best describes your beliefs.

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Dr. David McBride (dwm) @dwm.me.uk · 19/08/2026

This is a case of the University not renewing their contract. If it was over the concern cited, they'd drop it immediately. From this I infer that there is something about the successor contract terms which are unacceptable.

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Reposted by Dr. David McBride (dwm)

David Lewis @davidclewis.bsky.social · 18/08/2026

18 August 2026 at 16:44
Threads is used by people who think they run the country; Bluesky is used by people who think they ought to run the country; X is used by the people who actually do run the country; Instagram is used by the wives of the people who run the country; Linkedln is used by people who own the country; TikTok is used by people who think the country ought to be run by another country; and Facebook is used by people who think it is.

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Dr. David McBride (dwm) @dwm.me.uk · 16/08/2026

Cuts: £50bn Affects: 6m people. So, Reform's plan to improve the economy is to deprive everyone in the UK who is receiving support for a disability an average of £16666 per person? www.bbc.co.uk/news/article... (Not that you can see the actual details of the plan, because it's behind a paywall.)

bbc.co.uk

Reform UK plans to overhaul welfare system to save £50bn and replace Pip

The party's proposed changes were they to come to power include a replacement for the disability payments system Pip.

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John Burn-Murdoch @jburnmurdoch.ft.com · 07/08/2026

New from me: Britain’s graduate earnings premium is falling, cue “too many go to university!” But non-university outcomes are also bad, cue “we must reform vocational routes!” Both miss the point: people used to think education drove economic outcomes, but the economy drives educational outcomes.

Chart showing that US workers who are functionally illiterate earn roughly the same per hour as the average British worker

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Ben Goldacre @bengoldacre.bsky.social · 04/08/2026

I’m not online much, I haven't paid any attention to Rod Liddle for a long time, I didn't really know his extremes. I do now: I wouldn’t have posted if I'd known. I’ve seen death of difficult people up close (and its impact on others): that’s the only reason it was on my mind as an issue.

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Tom Loosemore @tomski.com · 04/08/2026

I've written a long blog post about AI Agents and the need for those running services to prepare - technically, operationally, commercially, strategically, legally and in terms of policy. AI Agents could be a properly huge deal. There. I wrote it. loosemore.com/2026/08/04/k...

loosemore.com

Know Your Agent: Why you should act now, to avoid playing catch-up later

Back in March, I was beaten by the bins. I’d spent a happy few evenings (and a great many tokens) trying to build a simple web app: share any UK address, find out which bins to put out, and w…

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Dr. David McBride (dwm) @dwm.me.uk · 03/08/2026

I can see that, particularly if it's not someone you knew much about, the glee with which some are celebrating that persons' death can make you stop short and feel dismay. Doctors in particular, who have been close to the realities of death too often. On the other hand: bsky.app/profile/dwm....

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Dr. David McBride (dwm) @dwm.me.uk · 03/08/2026

I dunno man, if a person uses their unusual skill and limited time on this earth to be a sustained, artful fuckbastard, maybe we shouldn't be too surprised to see people celebrating their passing.

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Steffen Rayburn-Maarup @rayburnmaarup.bsky.social · 02/08/2026

I don't think people are ready for this kind of joke yet.

A town sign seen through a train window.

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Dr. David McBride (dwm) @dwm.me.uk · 02/08/2026

I think this is unfortunately conflating scientific expertise and consensus and subsequent political decision-making. The scientific consensus was that to stop spread, you had to stop mixing. They were right. The political decision at the time was then to close schools to limit that spread.

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Dr. David McBride (dwm) @dwm.me.uk · 01/08/2026

8% of *first preference* votes is a spectacular failure. First-past-the-post voting for MPs is rather less reliable as a reflection of the population, but it seems likely that, the next time a GE is called, the Conservatives will be all but done.

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NCSC UK @ncsc.gov.uk · 28/07/2026

The NCSC has co-sealed joint guidance to assist critical national infrastructure operators in becoming more resilient to the expanding cyber threat. The advice, published by the Five Eyes cyber security agencies, outlines six steps to take to successfully isolate vital systems.

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Dr. David McBride (dwm) @dwm.me.uk · 27/07/2026

I joyfully laughed at this so many times, in a way nothing has prompted me to do for ages and ages. It's very good. Go in cold. Trust me.

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Dr Dave Clements @davecl.bsky.social · 27/07/2026

Lots of cuts in UK astronomy being announced today including the closure of eMERLIN & Jodrell Bank. These closures are being announced just after the UK National Astronomy Meeting ended, as if STFC & UKRI wanted to wait until we'd all gone home to avoid a fuss www.theguardian.com/science/2026...

theguardian.com

Jodrell Bank Observatory facing closure after major funder cuts support

Scientists say decision is blow to UK astronomy as deep space observatory is home to world-leading facilities

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James Tarry @northamptonian.bsky.social · 25/07/2026

Only just got to see this. It contains a remarkable graph. Appears that Councils stopped building houses...and basically nobody took their place.

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Dr. David McBride (dwm) @dwm.me.uk · 25/07/2026

So many possible choices. Is it cheating to say, "Rory Bremner"?

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Jay Reding @jayreding.bsky.social · 25/07/2026

I’d have to go with Patrick Stewart or Amelia Tyler… although the latter in outtake mode would be VERY interesting… youtu.be/0YG0Fd63_70?...

youtu.be

Baldur's Gate 3 - Narrator outtakes #1

YouTube video by Amelia Tyler

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Dorian Lynskey @dorianlynskey.bsky.social · 13/07/2026

This is extremely good advice in under two minutes. I could have used this when my freelancing fell through the floor during Covid

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Nicolas Fulghum @nicolasfulghum.bsky.social · 09/07/2026

Solar's sharp rise continues. As of April 2026, global solar capacity now exceeds 3 terawatt. 1 gigawatt → 1 terawatt: 20+ years 1 terawatt → 2 terawatt: 33 months 2 terawatt → 3 terawatt: 19 months

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ahdok @socksandpuppets.com · 10/07/2026

Here in the UK, some people put political signs up along the street to show support for whichever candidate they've voting for. I've been on the lookout regarding the Clacton by-election. It seems that for about one day a week, Count Binface has near 100% support. Never seen so much support before.

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John Bull @garius.bsky.social · 09/07/2026

What's screwing the Daily Mail and tabloids is it's basically impossible to go through Count Binface's bin for dirt without him noticing.

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Tom Francis @pentadact.com · 29/06/2026

The humble bar graph taking a bold step into 3D here, while never losing sight of its passion: clearly showing which numbers are bigger.

A 3D bar graph where the smaller bars are closer to us, making them taller than the larger ones.

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